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Gotta give credit where it's due - Paul @ Bama

6K views 119 replies 18 participants last post by  audioAl 
#1 · (Edited)
Okay, so some of you may have seen the less than pleasant experience I had when I ordered the tuner for the car. To say I was pissed would be a bit more than an understatement. Anyways....

I had the initial tunes on the car and it did absolutely squat....4 hp over stock. The data logs were all over the place, the ECM was pulling timing, torque management was killing response, there was a hole in the power between 4000 - 4500, etc....the car was not happy.

Now, I've been working with Paul over the last couple weeks, thrashing on the car, data logging every scenario I could think of, providing my critique of the car and the logs and sending all this stuff to Paul. We're on revision #3 right now and the car feels SOLID. The data logs look great, timing is almost spot on, no torque management kicking it, AFR's look fantastic, knock sensors aren't going crazy, and other than one small blip right at 2900 RPM's, the car is running great. I'm really happy with how it's running right now.

I just got done logging this last revision doing some cold start normal driving and then a few 4th gear runs to redline on my "test track". Other than some REALLY minor stuff that could be atmospherics or fuel, the logs look almost perfect. I'm gonna shoot these off to Paul in a bit and see what he thinks. If he's happy with them, I'll strap the car back down this week and see how it does on the dyno.

I can be a pretty demanding bastard, but I give credit when I see some positive results. :thumb:
 
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#2 ·
Here is just how well it's running now. These are just a few pictures of the screen when I was looking through the log. Again, this is 4th gear and on the floor....











 
#5 · (Edited)
This should give ya a better idea of the difference now.....

Here is what the car was doing when it was stock at WOT. You can see the timing is all over the place, knock sensors are over reacting, torque management is kicking in, etc....



Now, here is what it looks like now. I highlighted the timing and the torque management so you can see the difference....




The car is dead smooth from the instant you smash it until it hits the rev limiter. One thing to note.....with no torque management, when it hits that rev limiter, it tries to lift you outta the seat. It's not a subtle cut-back, it's shut the power off NOW.
 
#6 ·
Hey Silver,

Thank you for taking the time to have this posted up and I'm so glad to hear that Paul has you all buttoned up. He is an amazing tuner and I can't wait to strap my 2014 GT down to our Dyno again!

Since you were less than pleased with your original numbers and we are all confident that they will skyrocket this time around, how would you like your next Dyno session to be on me?

Shoot me over a PM and I will cover your next dyno session to get some new numbers!

Hope this helps and let me know if you have any questions.

-Will
 
#8 ·
Will,

I appreciate it, but dyno time doesn't cost me anything.

I told Paul I wouldn't strap it back down until he said he was happy with the tune and I'd put it back on the dyno whenever it was convenient for him so if something came up I could shoot him the logs and dyno sheets while I had it on the roller.

......

Kevin,

When I strap it back down you'll see the before and after results. This was just driving the car and working on the tunes. What some folks don't understand about tuning is the peak power numbers are the easy part, it's the driveability that takes the longest....right now the car is driving fantastic, except that little 2900 RPM spot, which I highlighted in 3 spots in the logs I sent to Paul.
 
#9 ·
Is this typical of using a tune. It's great that the customer service is so good but as a complete novice I am getting nervous about adding a Cai and tune.
I have no experience with it and I was hoping for more of a plug in and go experience. It's my daily drive and I really am just looking to fix the lagging throttle response. And once in a while I want to shut up my friends driving the "other" cars.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Mustang Evolution mobile app
 
#11 · (Edited)
Is this typical of using a tune. It's great that the customer service is so good but as a complete novice I am getting nervous about adding a Cai and tune.
I have no experience with it and I was hoping for more of a plug in and go experience. It's my daily drive and I really am just looking to fix the lagging throttle response. And once in a while I want to shut up my friends driving the "other" cars.
Well, I'll put it like this.....

I've tuned a lot of cars and trucks, my experience is with LS motors and diesel though. You can take 2 identical vehicles, put the same tune on them and one responds totally different. Even with a known, powerful, good performing tune, you can put it on another vehicle and it won't run worth a crap.

I have a bunch of "base" files that I use as starting points, but the bottom line is that it ALWAYS takes a good deal of log time to get it perfect for any one specific car or truck.

When my truck was still a daily driver it was doing 930 hp to the tires and ran fantastic. Had a buddy with a near identical truck that wanted it tuned, so we started with the tune I used on my truck......his would barely break 600 hp, smoked, ran hot, etc. His truck was probably the biggest PITA I've ever dealt with and it was almost identical to mine.

So, plug and play doesn't always get you good results, you have to be willing to put in the seat time to get it dialed in.

I never stop logging, even after I'm pretty happy with a vehicle. Not necesarilly in daily driving situations, but any time I go to the track, or the dyno, or just go to my "test track" to scratch off, the data logs are running. I look at them frame by frame, comparing PID's, looking for anything to improve on. It's not a one-shot, hit it and quit it kind of deal.
 
#14 ·
Ford offers a tune for the A6 too. Granted, it's very weak, and doesn't have lopey idle, or any of that. Their biggest claim on the procal A6 tune is 60 torque at 2k rpm. Barely alters shift points.
 
#16 ·
Okay, so yesterday Paul shot me revision #4 of the tune and this morning and afternoon I had a few changes to do some hits on it again. Still getting a little bit of spark knock over 5000 RPM's but nothing crazy. The max timing that is being pulled is 3 degrees....compared to as much as 9 degrees initially. In these charts I highlighted the spark knock data, but it's kind of skewed in relation to the actual data as the software doesn't really scale the values in relation to those around it, so it seems like a bigger amount than it really is. Like I said, it's only pulling a MAX of 3 degrees over the RPM range.

I was able to get three good WOT hits in 4th gear and they're all pretty close to each other, so it's showing good consistency....







Now, here is something that may actually interest a few folks a bit more than my WOT data.....here is that surge that you feel around 2900 RPM's when the car is still cold. I've been logging all my cold starts over the last couple days and seem to see the trend. The break point seems to be coolant temp related....as soon as the coolant hits 150*'s, the surge drops off dramatically and almost totally disappears. It seems like it's arbitrarily increasing throttle angle right at 2900 RPM's and that's what's causing the surge. This can be caused by a bunch of things and may not be part of the mapping from SCT.....if you don't have the parameter mapped, you can't adjust it. This is common in almost all custom tuning softwares (HP Tuners, EFILive, and SCT). There are these annoying little modifiers and multipliers and limiter that, if not mapped, make dealing with issues almost impossible. Right now it looks like this is one of those areas that isn't mapped yet in SCT's software.

Anyways, I've been able to catch the surge multiple times and have sent these to Paul. Maybe they can get the folks at SCT to look a little further into the ECM mapping for more of the multipliers, modifiers and limiters so we can kill this little surge issue....



 
#17 ·
WHEW! She's gittin' down now.....

This is Revision 5 from Paul. The car is running REALLY solid now. Getting a couple VERY small knock sensor hits around 5000 RPM's, but they're VERY minor ones. The car is pulling really strong all the way through the RPM range.







 
#20 · (Edited)
This should give ya a real clear example of how much the car was over reacting when it was stock. Timing was way off, knock sensors were going nuts, torque management was kicking in, etc.

I have NO DOUBT that the car is gonna make a pretty significant improvement the next time I strap it down.....especially in the mid-range RPM's. It looks like it's going to make a REALLY solid gain there.



 
#23 ·
Trust me, you're not the only one. It's not isolated just to Mustangs either. My '14 Focus did it, guys have reported it in the F150's, etc. There ahs to be something in one of the tables referencing throttle position, coolant temp, and / or load because those are the parameters that I see jumping around right at 2900 RPM's.
 
#25 ·
If you go up to post #16 you'll see where I caught in the logs. I also sent those into Paul and noted the spots it happens. Not sure what will come of it, but it's always good to note the problems.
 
#26 ·
I don't have a base file for this car in HP Tuners format, but in the '05 - '10 cars there is a spot where the ECM swtiches the cam timing from low speed to high speed at 1900 RPM's. I'm wondering if this is what's going on in these cars, but at 2900 RPM's and if it also affects the CMCP's.
 
#27 ·
Got revision 6 from Paul last night and got it loaded on the car. The weather isn't looking real good for smashing in the car the next few days, but if I get a break I'll put some hits on it. More than likely this should be the last set of small corrections before the car is ready to see what it can actually do, as the last version was actually really good......just a few little knock sensor hits around 5000 RPM's.
 
#28 ·
Annnnnd, we're good. It's at the point where the knock sensors are now trying to add timing vs take it away. The car is pulling really well and Paul is happy with the tune, so it's time to strap this sucker back down and see what she does. It'll probably be Thurs afternoon or Friday before I time to put it back on the dyno.

If you look at the logs below you can see where the knock sensors are showing negative values. This isn't pulling timing, this is adding timing, which is what you're looking for. The closer the knock sensor can stay to zero on the negative side, the closer the tune is to being dead on an not relying on the sensors to keep it from detonating.

This was banging 1st through 4th gear.....


This is WOT in 4th gear....
 
#31 ·
Well, long story short, the baseline SCT tune made more power and the curves followed each other exactly.

Best numbers....
Stock - 380 hp
Bama - 387 hp
SCT Baseline - 390 hp
 
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